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From the wiki
"according to the UK-based Association for the Scientific Study of Anomalous Phenomena (ASSAP), reports of sightings in Britain to their office had declined by 96% from 1988 to 2012.[104]"

I was also searching for a cartoon I remembered about photographing ufos, but had to plow through an unfortunate number of “UFO” photos that even I could see were nothing more than light catching scratches on the window, etc. Just one factor for that 3x increase in number of reports with the number of smartphones.

This almost certainly refers to the 'recent' GoFast and Gimbal tapes that were released by the To The Stars Academy; these were filmed back in 2004. These have been fairly comprehensively debunked by the Metabunk forum, and probably show nothing more exciting than a bird and a distant plane.

If there has been another uptick in the number of reports since these videos were publicised (note that they were available before this, but no-one took much notice) then this is probably due to increased enthusiasm for UFOs among pilots, rather than a real increase in observations.

But there have been "a number of reports of unauthorized and/or unidentified aircraft entering various military-controlled ranges and designated air space in recent years," according to the statement.
"These kinds on incursions can be both a security risk and pose a safety hazard for both Navy and Air Force aviation. For safety and security concerns, the Navy and the USAF takes these reports very seriously and investigates each and every report."

How do we move from reporting incidents likely caused by known aircraft of such description, ie drugrunners, drones, other unregulated UAVs, microlights, ultralights, etc to "OMG ALIENS!"? Is the only association that an alien spacecraft might be in that same description? "Fair and balanced" reporting so they ask Elizondo for a quote?
It sounds to me like this is a set-up to get better figures on actual mundane airspace incursions, so that with hard numbers it will be easier to gain funding to reduce the associated hazards to pilots (and passengers). Or does the video with the article counter that idea? (other than just "that's what they want you to think"?)

____________"Dumb all over, a little ugly on the side." -- Frank Zappa"Your right to hold an opinion is not being contested. Your expectation that it be taken seriously is." -- Jason Thompson"This is really very simple, but unfortunately it's very complicated." -- publiusModerator comments in this color | Get moderator attention using the lower left icon:
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One thing we can be sure of, unregulated drone use will increase in coming years, but if any trespass into controlled space, they will be jammed or shot down. Assuming the military has the capacity to do so, of course. I think this will become true of most military organisations around the world- but it is also possible that drones will become more sophisticated and less vulnerable too.

One thing we can be sure of, unregulated drone use will increase in coming years, but if any trespass into controlled space, they will be jammed or shot down. Assuming the military has the capacity to do so, of course. I think this will become true of most military organisations around the world- but it is also possible that drones will become more sophisticated and less vulnerable too.

(off topic continuation) Saw a tech article about drones with weapons on Twitter yesterday. Seems these are real tings, and if they are showing and talking about them, the secret stuff must be way more awesome. Not the big plane drones, small ones with regular weapons. And even smaller suicide drones.

This almost certainly refers to the 'recent' GoFast and Gimbal tapes These have been fairly comprehensively debunked by the Metabunk forum, and probably show nothing more exciting than a bird and a distant plane.

A good way to test might be for one ship to launch a drone, and not tell another ship--and see what becomes of it. The flare is what looks like the so called "tic-tac" with digital blooming from those low res gun-sight cameras. The drone never left the pipper. If it were capable of wild behavior, it should have zoomed out of view of one plane, and into the gun camera of another, or beyond.

Instead the "Brewster Buffalo" of fighters, the FA-18, seemed to be able to keep up.

Nice idea, but the Taranis flew in 2013, and these sightings occurred in 2004. The drone may have been an earlier version, I suppose. Much earlier. Since these sightings happened in or near a test range, something along these lines is quite likely.

____________"Dumb all over, a little ugly on the side." -- Frank Zappa"Your right to hold an opinion is not being contested. Your expectation that it be taken seriously is." -- Jason Thompson"This is really very simple, but unfortunately it's very complicated." -- publiusModerator comments in this color | Get moderator attention using the lower left icon:
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Now he [Chris Mellon] works with a civilian group called To the Stars Academy of Arts & Science, trying to prod the U.S. defense and intelligence communities to investigate reports of unidentified aerial phenomena (UAPs—also known as UFOs) that maneuver in ways that have no known precedent.

And I also notice they don't say anything about that "civilian group" (which happened to make a filing to the SEC and sold stock). Just from a current review, it looks like they changed the site, but not too long ago, they said they were researching, along with UFOs, telepathy, consciousness, engineering the space time metric, beamed propulsion (actually an almost mundane subject, except you have to wonder what special expertise they would bring to the table). Oh, and they are also there for entertainment and they would really like you to give them money.

They have notable people on board like Hal Puthoff. You might remember him (along with Russell Targ) being involved in the infamous "psychic" tests of the magician Uri Geller. A little background here: Decades ago, I took psychic abilities pretty seriously, since I thought at the time some of them had been verified in careful scientific studies. The Puthoff and Targ fiasco was one of the things that shifted me to an extreme skeptic on the subject. When others pointed out how it was possible to cheat through their tests, their typical response to say things like "How dare you accuse the participants of cheating" rather than acknowledge experimental deficiencies. Anyway, Puthoff has a special place for me as being one of the people that helped move me to a more skeptical worldview.

Oh, and they have money troubles (or at least they did when these articles were written):

The long and short of it is that this "To the Stars Academy" pegs my nonsense meter (though I usually would use a word that starts with "bull" in that phrase). I consider anyone working for them and speaking for them is most likely doing it to try to make money. If somebody wants me to take them seriously when discussing UFOs, I expect some minimum level of credibility. I also don't take articles very seriously if they mention the "To the Stars Academy" uncritically.

"The problem with quotes on the Internet is that it is hard to verify their authenticity." — Abraham Lincoln

I say there is an invisible elf in my backyard. How do you prove that I am wrong?

I've come to learn that name recognition often means little. What do you think about the company he works for? Do you think this To the Stars Academy sounds reputable?

Also, what do you think about comments like this (from the article you linked):

I ran that all the way up the flagpole with the Air Force and others, and believe me, everyone respected Senator Byrd. No one was going to lie to him and risk his wrath. And the answer was, “Absolutely not. We don’t have a super-secret black triangle that can go at hypersonic speeds and all that sort of thing.”

"The problem with quotes on the Internet is that it is hard to verify their authenticity." — Abraham Lincoln

I say there is an invisible elf in my backyard. How do you prove that I am wrong?

Yet they seem to be poor at analysing videos. The three videos they have released so far all seem to have been very badly analysed by Elizondo and his crew, who failed to allow for the effects of parallax as seen from a moving 'plane.

Do you consider that a serious article? For instance, how about this phrase?

These are the facts that UFO Deniers choose to ignore.

And, as far as I can see, nothing of actual substance in the article. Can you point out something you consider substantial?

Do you notice what, for instance, it does NOT say about Hal Puthoff (very well known for his pseudoscience)?

Incidentally, this reminds me that when they were asking for money, one of the things they advertised was research on "advanced electrogravitic propulsion." I remember laughing out loud at that. They should start with demonstrating the principles behind basic electrogravitic propulsion first. I'm waiting, but I haven't seen it.

Essentially, I don't see these guys being any different from, for instance, companies pushing cold fusion or the Theranos fake medical device. They can have people with name recognition (that's a common tactic) but it's important to look at what they are saying, and what they are trying to sell. And here, it's one thing to discuss research on unidentified phenomena, and another thing to strongly suggest they have an inside scoop on alien spaceships with anti-gravity drives. Oh, and telepathy is somehow involved too.

"The problem with quotes on the Internet is that it is hard to verify their authenticity." — Abraham Lincoln

I say there is an invisible elf in my backyard. How do you prove that I am wrong?

I was just wondering why persons with a good background would be involved. Guess it is the money aspect...

Well, there are lots of people with good backgrounds, and that doesn't mean that they can't have weird ideas about things. They're humans just like the rest of us, and can have their own eccentricities.

I was just wondering why persons with a good background would be involved. Guess it is the money aspect...

Can you be more specific in what exactly is "good background" for whom, and how that impacts the value of what they say or claim?

____________"Dumb all over, a little ugly on the side." -- Frank Zappa"Your right to hold an opinion is not being contested. Your expectation that it be taken seriously is." -- Jason Thompson"This is really very simple, but unfortunately it's very complicated." -- publiusModerator comments in this color | Get moderator attention using the lower left icon:
Recommended reading:Forum Rules * Forum FAQs * Conspiracy Theory Advice * Alternate Theory Advocates Advice

Can you be more specific in what exactly is "good background" for whom, and how that impacts the value of what they say or claim?

These seem to have a good background:

A former Senior 'Service Member' at the CIA. -Jim Semivan(2) The former Director of the "Skunkworks" program at Lockheed Martin. - Steve Justice(3) The former head of a secret government program that's solely dedicated to 'aerospace threat identification'. - Luis Elizondo(4) A guy with a Ph.D. from Stanford University who is a career space propulsion expert who advises NASA. - Dr. Hal Puthoff(5) The former Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Intelligence in the Clinton and Bush Administrations. - Chris Mellon(6) A Stanford University professor in the Department of Microbiology and Immunology who has published more than 220 research articles, is the holder of 20 US patents, has been honored as one of the top 25 inventors at Stanford University and is the first recipient of the Teal Innovator Award (2012) from the Department of Defense. - Dr. Garry Nolan(7) A world renowned brain function & consciousness expert who has been officially honored by the CIA for "significant contributions to the mission of the Office of Research and Development". - Dr. Paul Rapp(8) A guy who has spent 30 years working with the CIA and the Intelligence Community as a consultant/advisor in the biological weapons of mass destruction field. - Dr. Norm Kahn(9) A biochemist with 28 years of research experience in the cell and molecular biology fields (and who also served as Deputy Administrator of a US government funded threat assessment program focused on advanced aerospace technology). - Dr. Colm Kelleher(10) And a scientist with biomedical academic and research experience as well as an active, licensed, attorney who among other things has collaborated with the DOD’s Traumatic Injury Research Program. - Dr. Adele Gilpin

They have backgrounds that at first sight seem impressive. But think about it, how many others are there with pretty much equal skills and experience, who do not condone this commercial venture? And seriously... a consciousness expert? An attorney? Directors/managers? "advises NASA" seems pretty thin. Elizondo's listed background is just funny. It's so secret he's not even allowed in LinkedIn! Frankly, the whole list reads as a souped-up resumé from a candidate who knows normally he's got little chance, with each item more or less true, but puffed up to look like much more than it is.

Originally Posted by gzhpcu

or do you disagree?

What does "good" mean? How does their particular background make their opinions and claims any more believable than all those others with similar backgrounds?

____________"Dumb all over, a little ugly on the side." -- Frank Zappa"Your right to hold an opinion is not being contested. Your expectation that it be taken seriously is." -- Jason Thompson"This is really very simple, but unfortunately it's very complicated." -- publiusModerator comments in this color | Get moderator attention using the lower left icon:
Recommended reading:Forum Rules * Forum FAQs * Conspiracy Theory Advice * Alternate Theory Advocates Advice

Other people may have different opinions about this, but if the goal of the organization is to publicize something that is quite controversial like that, then I don’t think that credibility is particularly important. If you are trying to build an engine, you want engineers. But if you take something that is based on belief, then you will find people with impeccable qualifications who will believe or not believe.

If you're asking me, and if we're discussing a controversial issue like UFOs, I would take people seriously that demonstrate expertise within the subject area, and are careful not to make too many assumptions or make claims far beyond the data (and I don't care if they claim they have super-secret data because there's no way for me to evaluate that - put up or shut up).

So, for instance, I don't care if someone is a good biologist when the subject is about the evaluation of UFO claims. I do care, for example, what expertise they have in evaluating eye witness claims regarding the subject. I want to see how they present some example evaluations. If they are quick to assume a vehicle of some sort is involved where there simply isn't enough data to support that, I won't consider them credible.

I also take a dim view of known pseudoscientists generally, like the previously mentioned Hal Puthoff. He has a history of getting involved with a lot of nonsense, and has repeatedly demonstrated his lack of interest in scientific methodology.

Or if someone starts talking about engineering the space time metric, or electrogravitic propulsion, I want to see peer reviewed scientific papers (and not from predatory journals, either). Again, I don't care if they claim some secret research. When and if you can show it, I'll be interested. Otherwise, I see no reason to take it seriously.

"The problem with quotes on the Internet is that it is hard to verify their authenticity." — Abraham Lincoln

I say there is an invisible elf in my backyard. How do you prove that I am wrong?

I'd say that the background of the speakers doesn't matter as much as the reliability of their evidence.

What evidence, you ask?

...Oh.

Yes, evidence matters. But there's also an issue for me of how much time I'm willing to spend digging into someone's claims. People with a poor science/skepticism track record, who make wild unsupported claims, demonstrate lack of subject matter expertise, make no secret of working for an entertainment company . . . well, they aren't credible enough for me to spend a lot of time listening to them.

And it's sad really: When I was young, I took the ET visitation hypothesis pretty seriously, and never have been against careful UFO research, but my impression is that what you typically see are the clowns, because the serious work just doesn't result in anything newsworthy. Accordingly, my skepticism increased substantially over the years.

"The problem with quotes on the Internet is that it is hard to verify their authenticity." — Abraham Lincoln

I say there is an invisible elf in my backyard. How do you prove that I am wrong?